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The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

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Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#301

Post by llimos »

Most people on HN are rational people who look at the world in a rational way. Bitcoin and friends are not operating in a rational market, therefore we don't understand them, and most of us would probably be pretty lousy investors since we would try to make decisions rationally instead of memeing and YOLOing.

But, and this is a key point, that doesn't make us right and them wrong. It's just a different kind of market, one that I am not very good at, but it is for sure possible to make money in it. You just need to be a different kind of person. We can say our way is "better", but who are we to decide that?

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#302

Post by horsawlarway »

throwaway21332 wrote: post #228
horsawlarway wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but value without an enforcement mechanism is not very useful. People usually want to trade stored value in exchange for goods and services (at least in a functioning value store - I don't really believe bitcoin serves that purpose at the moment). So lets say we agree that I pay you 10k in bitcoin in exchange for you remodeling my bathroom (and ignore how unlikely this scenario is with real crypto currencies).…

You're conflating two issues with each other. One is having a decentralized currency with a fixed monetary policy. Another issue is the counterparty risk. Bitcoin is not designed to solve the counterparty risk, it's just a digital cash that has a fixed emission schedule. It can be stolen just like regular physical cash can be. Smart Contracts try to solve the counterparty risk issue, but it's just an extra layer arou…

See, I think you're disconnecting two issues which are inherently related.

Fraud is not going anywhere anytime soon. If you have no proposed mechanism to reconcile fraud, I'd argue there's not any true value stored.

If the proposed mechanism is "just use the existing government" then the whole house of cards in built on the back of that central authority enforcing ownership for you anyways in which case why not just use the currency that authority already sponsors and has a proven track record of enforcing?

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#303

Post by paulgb »

sjtindell wrote: post #283
paulgb wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was referring to this part: > stablecoins subvert the ability of the Federal Reserve to print money and give it to their friends at Goldman Sachs et al

But you said “their friends to print money” not “print money for their friends”.

Ok, fair, the part that I excerpted did confuse the two, but OP goes on to say:

> David at Goldman Sachs starts with 1 dollar, you each have 50% of the wealth in the "nation." David and his friends start printing themselves money

“David at Goldman Sachs” presumably refers to David Solomon, CEO of GS, and in this part of the post he and his friends are the ones printing the money.

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#304

Post by dragonwriter »

JuliusBranson wrote: post #162
andrewla wrote: post #103

If anything, I think stablecoins are way more dangerous than the author indicates. People talk about things like Bitcoin as a threat to sovereign currencies, and they are, as competitors, of sorts. But stablecoins are another matter entirely. One huge aspect of the value of sovereign currencies is that they are instruments of law -- courts will settle in them as a lowest common denominator, and it is safe to use them…

Stablecoins are dangerous because they have the potential to change the current selection effects on the elite. For one thing, stablecoins subvert the ability of the Federal Reserve to print money and give it to their friends at Goldman Sachs et al --- normally this is supposed to result in their friends have a larger fraction of money than they previously had. You start with 1 dollar, David at Goldman Sachs starts w…

> When there's stablecoin, you just put your dollar in stablecoin before they print the money, the dollar inflates, stablecoin goes up proportionately,

Printing fiat makes stablecoins denominated in the currency lose real value, not gain in it. (Stablecoins denominated in a different currency would gain nominal value in the printed currency, the same way direct holdings in the alternative currency would.)

So, no, to the extent easy money policy makes people rich fairly directly, holders of stablecoins denominated in the currency would not be among the beneficiaries.

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#305

Post by AnimalMuppet »

andrewla wrote: post #103

If anything, I think stablecoins are way more dangerous than the author indicates. People talk about things like Bitcoin as a threat to sovereign currencies, and they are, as competitors, of sorts. But stablecoins are another matter entirely. One huge aspect of the value of sovereign currencies is that they are instruments of law -- courts will settle in them as a lowest common denominator, and it is safe to use them…

Wait, you can't legally buy stocks with cash? Why not?

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#306

Post by cto_of_antifa »

matheusmoreira wrote: post #281
blacksmith_tb wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which could be compelling if you lived in a society where the banks were extremely unstable, but looks terrible if you live in one with regulation, deposit insurance and and other account protections.

Banks are the government's instrument of total surveillance and enforcement in the financial sector.

How so? Can you explain how it works in detail? I feel like this is the sort of story that would have won somebody a pullizer.

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#307

Post by dqpb »

bgroat wrote: post #213
dqpb wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Algorand is carbon negative.

Which is awesome, but I Algorand is < 0.5% of the crypto-ecosystem

Well, this is how progress happens. Someone complains about a whole industry in broad brushstrokes, someone else invalidates the complaint with a counter example, and we move forward with the better option.

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#308

Post by yawniek »

chuckcode wrote: post #286
can16358p wrote: post #121

Not being pegged to a centralized, state-controlled currency is a dealbreaker for me. It's still in infancy and it's true that 99% of the projects are get-rich-quick schemes with no intrinsic value. Though, I think the author lives in a country with a trustworthy government because that's not the case for many people including me. In the last two days my country's currency has shaken much more than crypto and I don't…

I'm a little surprised that the author is missing the critical innovation of crypto which is digital trust and observability. Sure it is easy to make an argument that one cryptocurrency or another is a bubble, but don't underestimate the importance of being able to distribute work and verify trust at scale. Just look at how git has transformed software development by mapping code to a hash. Or how DNS + SSL has trans…

Thats all true but still there is the hard to deny fact that a federated trust based system is more efficient. See tls in web. With all the flaws it works remarkably well.

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#309

Post by BTCOG »

throwaway21332 wrote: post #228
horsawlarway wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but value without an enforcement mechanism is not very useful. People usually want to trade stored value in exchange for goods and services (at least in a functioning value store - I don't really believe bitcoin serves that purpose at the moment). So lets say we agree that I pay you 10k in bitcoin in exchange for you remodeling my bathroom (and ignore how unlikely this scenario is with real crypto currencies).…

You're conflating two issues with each other. One is having a decentralized currency with a fixed monetary policy. Another issue is the counterparty risk. Bitcoin is not designed to solve the counterparty risk, it's just a digital cash that has a fixed emission schedule. It can be stolen just like regular physical cash can be. Smart Contracts try to solve the counterparty risk issue, but it's just an extra layer arou…

Not sure why you're being downvoted for providing a good answer here. When you use Bitcoin, or cash it is solely your responsibility to protect that counterparty risk via your own means. Without a contract and receipt, the same would happen to your cash if you walked into a business and the owner decided to keep a small sum of your money with no record of transaction. If you gave a shop owner or autobody mechanic $50-500 cash with no receipt he could very easily just keep your cash. You have no recourse. Call the police? Doesn't matter in real life because you have no receipt or contract. It's your word against his. Since I see that you've just replied and still want "recourse" if someone steals your money I'll just clearly spell that out for you. You cause the level of recourse of your stolen money that you require. Whether via violence or a counter-theft and damage to the thief equaling what was stolen from you. It's left up to you with Bitcoin. If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen. We don't want government intervention.

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#310

Post by zaphar »

andrewla wrote: post #65
germinalphrase wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If all transaction can be tracked, what prevents the [FBI\et al] from simply following the bitcoin trail until someone cashes out?

The fungibility of cash is what makes it hard, although likely law enforcement will be able to trace many of these. For example, you take your ill-gotten gains and just randomly send $1 to a million different addresses, some owned by you, some owned by random people or exchanges or whatever. Nobody's going to say no to free money, so the trail goes cold. Or you use an offshore exchange that doesn't really practice st…

    For example, you take your ill-gotten gains and just randomly send $1 to a 
    million different addresses, some owned by you, some owned by random people or 
    exchanges or whatever. Nobody's going to say no to free money, so the trail 
    goes cold.
This one wouldn't really cause the trail to go cold though. It would be trivial to automate the tracking and if all of those funds end up in a single location eventually that would also be trivial to automate tracking. You really would need to do a Mixing with other counterparties to get any kind of anonymity. Even then mixing can be detangled as well.
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